In defense of Clinton

Even before the report was released, the President's lawyers had
prepared a "prebuttal" to its expected allegations. On Saturday
they issued an "initial response" to the charges. A selection
from both defenses:

SMUT IN DISGUISE
--SEX, SEX AND JUST SEX

On May 31, 1998, the spokesman for the Independent Counsel
Kenneth W. Starr declared that the Office's Monica Lewinsky
investigation "is not about sex... " Now...it is plain that
"sex" is precisely what this four-and-a-half-year investigation
has boiled down to. The Referral is so loaded with irrelevant
and unnecessary graphic and salacious allegations that only one
conclusion is possible: its principal purpose is to damage the
President.

...Many of the lurid allegations...have no justification at
all... They plainly do not relate, even arguably, to activities
which may be within the definition of "sexual relations" in the
President's [Paula] Jones deposition, which is the excuse
advanced [by the Office of the Independent Counsel]. They are
simply part of a hit-and-run smear campaign, and their inclusion
says volumes about the OIC's tactics and objectives.

...Spectacularly absent from the Referral is any discussion of
contradictory or exculpatory evidence, or any evidence that
would cast doubt on the credibility of the testimony the OIC
cites (but does not explicitly quote). This is a failure of
fundamental fairness which is highly prejudicial to the
President, and it is reason alone to withhold judgment on the
Referral's allegations until all the prosecutors' evidence can
be scrutinized--and then challenged, as necessary, by evidence
from the President...

THE GRAND JURY SYSTEM
--A ONE-SIDED INQUIRY

Use of a federal grand jury to compile evidence for possible
impeachment proceedings in Congress raises numerous troubling
questions regarding the credibility of that evidence. Indeed,
given the limited role of a grand jury in our system and the
total absence of procedural protections in the process, the
Independent Counsel's insistence that his investigation has been
a search for "truth" is deeply misleading. In fact, it has been
a one-sided effort to present the worst possible version of a
limited set of facts... The grand jury's historic role is not to
determine the truth but rather to act as an accusatory body...

PERJURY
--THE GROUND RULES

The OIC ignores the careful standards that the courts have
mandated to prevent the misuse of perjury allegations... By
selectively presenting the facts and failing to set out the full
context of the answers that it claims may have been perjurious,
the OIC has presented a wholly misleading picture. This tactic
is most pronounced in the OIC's astonishing failure to set out
the initial definition of "sexual relations" presented by the
Jones lawyers at President Clinton's deposition... The burden
that must be met by the OIC extends beyond showing that the
President was wrong on the semantics, it must also show
that...he knew he was wrong and intended to lie--something that
the OIC could not begin to demonstrate. In fact, all the OIC has
is a witness who gave narrow answers to ambiguous questions.

KEN STARR'S OVERZEALOUSNESS
--A MANUFACTURED CONTROVERSY

The expansion of the Independent Counsel's jurisdiction [from
the Whitewater investigation] to encompass the Jones case and
Ms. Lewinsky did not occur by accident or easily... The sequence
of events suggests that Independent Counsel Starr deliberately
delayed requesting the expansion of his jurisdiction. Neither
Monica Lewinsky nor President Clinton had made any statements
under oath in the Jones case (at least that had been filed with
any court) when Linda Tripp approached the OIC on January 12.
The only evidence the OIC possessed at that time were tapes
illegally created by Tripp. The OIC itself proceeded to tape the
Tuesday, January 13 conversation between Tripp and Lewinsky. Ms.
Lewinsky's affidavit was not filed in the Jones case until
January 16, and the OIC had petitioned the Attorney General the
day before for an expansion of the authority based on the
evidence (the Tripp tapes and the OIC's tape) that he had
acquired without any authority to do so... This entire
sequence...suggests an intention by the OIC to ensure that the
expansion of jurisdiction was kept a secret until the President
and Ms. Lewinsky had given testimony under oath and (if Ms.
Lewinsky could be so persuaded) she had been enlisted to do
surreptitious taping. In other words, rather than taking steps
to defer or avoid any possible interference with the Jones case,
the OIC did everything in its power--and some things outside its
authority--to set up a case against the President.

A MATTER OF SCALE
--HOW HIGH A CRIME?

It has come down to this.

After four years, scores of FBI agents, hundreds of subpoenas,
thousands of documents and tens of millions of dollars...the
Office of the Independent Counsel has presented to the House a
Referral that no prosecutor would present to any jury.

...In 445 pages, the Referral mentions Whitewater, the failed
land deal which originated its investigation, twice. It never
once mentions other issues it has been investigating for
years--matters concerning the firing of employees of the White
House travel office and the controversy surrounding the FBI
files. By contrast, the issue of sex is mentioned more than 500
times, in the most graphic, salacious and gratuitous manner.

The Office of Independent Counsel is asking the House of
Representatives to undertake its most solemn and consequential
process short of declaring war; to remove a duly, freely and
fairly elected President of the United States because he had--as
he has admitted--an improper, illicit relationship outside his
marriage. Having such a relationship is wrong... But such acts
do not even approach the Constitutional test of
impeachment--"treason, bribery, or other high crimes and
misdemeanors."